


once after (14)

by cptsuke



Category: Animal Kingdom (TV)
Genre: And all that entails, Drug Use, Gen, Implied Childhood Sexual Abuse, minor in shitty situation, smurfs creepy parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-18 23:56:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20647823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cptsuke/pseuds/cptsuke
Summary: Deran only goes to see Julia once after she leaves. Just the once





	once after (14)

**Author's Note:**

> pls heed the smurfs creepy parenting tag, while nothing explicit happens in this, its definitely alluded to and i dont want anyone to stumble into that without warning. pls yell at me if theres any more warnings that you think i should add.

It's his own stupid fault, suddenly finding himself alone in the house.

His fault for getting weird with Adrian and then thinking too much about what Adrian said – _I'm gay_ \- and stupidly forgetting all his stupid self imposed rules that kept things okay at home. Stupid for skipping school cos he didn't want to deal with it, didn't know _how_ to deal with it, not til he thought about it hard enough to not say the wrong thing and screw up everything.

And he's so fucking stupid for not paying attention to where everyone else was today. For forgetting that Baz was over the border supposedly getting supplies for the next job but it wasn't exactly a well kept secret that those supplies always seemed to be in the exact same neighborhood that Lucy kept to when she wasn't in the states.

That Deran forgot Pope wasn't home because he'd stormed out yesterday after Cath had come round asking for Baz, angry as all hell and Deran had been glad at the time he was going out. Smurf had lied through her teeth at Cath and Pope had been looking for someone to hurt ever since. Deran wasn't stupid enough to wish him back home while he was like that. And Craig. Well, Craig didn't come home last night but ever since he'd turned sixteen he'd started a one man mission to fuck every lady that came near Oceanside so Deran's just gotta hope he's continuing that and not shitfaced in a gutter. He's alone in this big house and stupidly even misses Julia, and the way she used to lean on his door and with doped up eyes and lead her kid in like Deran was the best babysitting option. He kinda wishes she was back, that they could mention her name without Smurf turning the place into nuclear winter levels of icy, he'd even look after her stupid kid if it meant he wouldn't be alone in this house.

He's an idiot, Deran thinks as he realizes _he's not alone in the house._

The door to his bedroom opens slowly, his eyes track the movement as it creaks its way open and he freezes.

_He's such a fucking idiot._

After.

After when he's sitting on his bed shoving his feet into his skate shoes with trembling hands that are shaky and numb, he can't really feel anything right now. There's a low level buzz in his head and he's so fucking stupid he thinks again, but the thought is slipping around his head, unable to find traction in the hazy mess that's in his head.

He's gotta get out of here, gotta get somewhere he can breathe.

He doesn't even know where he's going, but he can't breathe, he's got to get out of his room, can't stay in it. So Deran walks down the hall, stands at the end, tries to feel better. He can hear the soft sound of footsteps on carpet from deeper in the house.

He doesn't feel better.

So he keeps going. Walks to the glass sliding doors, and then he's outside, vans slipping slightly on the damp bricks around the pool. He should have brought his skateboard he thinks as he throws himself over the security gate. His knees bend as he lands heavily, feeling the jolt of the landing traveling up his bones, it doesn't quite hurt but he can feel it. He's walking again before he can think anything else, down the road, off the street their house sits on.

He's not running – _jesus christ deran, you can't just run away every time you don't want to do something _Baz's voice whispers meanly in his head -he's not, he's just. Walking.

He's a couple of miles away before he thinks _where the fuck are you going?_ He doesn't have his wallet or his phone, but he can't find the energy to care.

He's just got to find a place to go. Things are weird with Adrian right now, now he's suddenly gay. Deran doesn't understand what that means, he _knows_ what it _means_, but what does that _mean_ for them? He can't go to Adrian's like he'd usually do. Can't go to the beach in case he's there. He doesn't want to see Adrian's wide eyed look of pity, can't stand to think about it, to be anywhere near Adrian when Deran's feeling like he's been pulled apart and put back wrong.

His feet take him to the shittier part of town, where some of the windows are boarded up and the buildings all stack up next to each other like they're leaning against the next for support, one quake away from coming tumbling down.

He stops in front of a door. He's never been here but he thinks he knows it.

There's a doorbell and it makes a distorted ringing noise when he presses it. So he presses it again.

And again.

And again.

And aga- the door is ripped open, “**What?!**” Julia shouts before she's even looking, her hand white knuckled on the door's edge. Her eyes narrow as she sees him. “Deran? What do you want?”

He doesn't want anything. Not really.

Julia's eyes are glassy and he hopes she's high enough to not slam the door in his face. She looks suspiciously around like maybe Smurf is somehow hiding down the hallway.

He thinks he should say something, _anything_, it's been a year since he's seen his sister, he should say something.

“Are you alone? What are you doing here, Deran?” She asks again.

Deran feels himself shrug, feels the cotton of his t-shirt shift with his shoulders. Julia looks around again, she looks just like she did a year ago screaming for them to all go fuck themselves, that she was never coming back, maybe she looks a bit more bonier, more tired, he should say something.

Julia looks down at him and sighs, then steps back and lets the door swing wide enough to be considered a _come in._

He walks past her, doesn't really look around, just find himself picking up some knock off robot toy off the couch. He can't see Josh anywhere, can't hear him. Is he here? Is he alone?

“He's still in school, idiot, where you should be.” Julia says and Deran wonders if he said anything out loud.

He wants to ask for a shower, wants to wash off this mood he's sunk into, but the idea of being naked here – _anywhere – _right now scares the shit out of him.

He blinks and he's curled up on the couch, Deran thinks he feels her hand brushing his hair from his face, the weight of an itchy blanket drops on him and he lets the weight carry him to sleep.

  


He wakes and feels a little bit more alive. Someone's petting at his hair, smoothing it where it's rucked up from the way he's burrowed into the couch.

“Mom?” he mumbles half asleep, but it can't be Smurf. _Julia?_ He thinks. But he can hear her voice, her laughing and talking somewhere across the room. He freezes, jolts up and scoots to the very end of the couch away from whoever's touching him.

Angela's high laugh sounds from the other end of the couch.

“You always had pretty hair.' She says, her hand reaching out like she's going to grab a handful of his hair. He jerks further back, willing to teeter on the couch arm to be that bit further away.

“I always wanted to be a blonde.” She says, stretching her arms to the sky, quest to touch Deran forgotten as she stands and wanders across to the kitchenette and whatever party favors Julia's got spread out on the counter.

Because it is a party, he realizes, skin crawling as he notices all the people suddenly in Julia's shitty two room apartment. Maybe not a Smurf level party, but eight or nine people fill the tiny living room, and they're all just a skeevy looking as the people from the drug fueled parties Smurf likes to throw when she's feeling old and mean.

Some creeper looms over him both like he'd been watching them, Angela petting at Deran or Deran sleeping, _Creep _all but tattooed across his thin face. Deran gets his feet under him, gets himself standing and plasters the ugliest look of disgust he's capable of on his face. Guy looks like every dealer Deran's ever met, skeevy with eyes lit up with a hunger that makes his skin crawl.

“He's a friend!” Angela squeals with a laugh as she comes back, a squeezing hug for the dealer who smiles at Deran with black shark eyes.

Deran hopes Julia's not stupid enough to consider her dealer a _friend._

  


Deran stupidly looks away. When he looks back the dealer's close to him, crowding him up against the wall. Deran looks wildly around for Julia, but there's just strangers with laughing mouths and glassy eyes. He doesn't even know if she'd help him if she saw, she lets people like this in the same house as her _kid._ The one she left home to protect. It's weird knowing he doesn't trust Julia to have his back here. He used to, he thinks, when did that change?

“You're Julia's brother?” The dealer asks, his voice low and whispering, and Deran shifts backwards as he sways closer, trying to keep the distance. “Pretty enough to be her sister with those eyes.”

Everyone always call him pretty, pinch his face, touch his hair, he fucking hates it.

His mouth is full of saliva, Deran feels like he's gonna throw up. But he's not some stupid kid, so he lifts his chin up pulls his face into the sneer that makes Pope come at him with clenched fists. One that's garnered him more slaps from adults than all of his vicious words combined.

He spits all that excess saliva and watches as it lands on the dealer's shoe.

His face twitches, oh he wants to fight, Deran can see it sparking in his dead eyes, but he won't. Not while Julia is still a viable meal ticket.

Deran's fists clench anyway, people like him smile and charm then turn on you like a rabid dog.

“Fucking hell, Deran, chill, he's just kidding.” Angela laughs, suddenly beside them Julia's laughing too, they seem like the same person, look more like twins than Julia and Pope ever did. He hates them in this moment.

The dealer doesn't look like he's kidding, he's got a hungry look lighting up his eyes from within. The same look Julia gets when she's jonesing and hurting and would trade anything she could see for just one more hit. Hungry and mean. Dangerous.

He doesn't say anything, just squares his shoulders, he's not a big kid but he can hold his own well enough.

The stand off doesn't last long, the dealer eventually just gives a mean laugh, wraps an arm around Angela's neck and whispers in her ear. She's laughing as they turn away, to get a drink, to get higher, to fucking fuck, Deran doesn't know, doesn't care. Julia's looking at him like he's harshing her vibe, ruining her good time, like she doesn't know why she opened the door to him to start with.

He doesn't know either.

_Why the fuck did he even come here?_

She catches him at the door, one hand catching his arm, pulling him up short like he's five not fourteen.

“Jesus Christ when are you going to grow up?”

“Why don't you just come home?” He asks stupidly and Julia's hand is on his face.

“You're lucky you're pretty,” she says with a laugh as her nails pinch into his skin. “because you're pretty fucking stupid.”

He pulls away, stumbling backwards into the hall outside her apartment

She thinks she's better than Smurf but she's exactly the same. They all are. Just take take _fucking_ take.

He hated that she got out. When she left, when she left all of them behind, never looking back. He hated her. But Deran thinks maybe he hates her more for getting out and just making the same fucking mess of her life, Smurf no longer pulling her strings but she's still got nothing, she's just as hungry and desperate as before, the only difference is now she's alone.

Deran won't be like that. If he's gonna get out, he's gotta have a plan, he swears to himself, he's gotta have _something_. Deran doesn't know what that is, he thinks as his feet take him back to the familiar streets near home, but he can wait, he can bide his time. When he gets out he's gonna _get out_, he's not going to trade one hell for another, he's going to have a plan, he's going to make it.

  
  



End file.
